Top 5 Amazon greenwashing tactics

1. Amazon “drastically undercounts” its carbon emissions

Even by its own estimate, Amazon is a major greenhouse gas emitter. In 2022, its annual emissions were over 70 million metric tonnes – equivalent to driving around the world more than 7 million times in a standard gas-powered car.  

Yet, even this number is likely to be an underestimate: the retail giant has been accused of “creative accounting” to drastically undercount its overall emissions.

Amazon only counts its own-brand products in its emissions calculations. It therefore ignores the vast majority of its retail business: both the products sold by third parties on its site, and the items that Amazon itself sells but which are manufactured and branded by another company.

This means that its reported emissions only cover around 1% of its online sales, according to a 2022 investigation by Reveal.

“This is how Amazon washes its hands of the climate impact of most of the things it sells. It simply decides to play by different rules than its peers,” Reveal said.

Amazon’s spokesperson didn’t address Reveal’s questions about the company’s accounting, but reiterated its commitment to cutting emissions.

And not content with undercounting emissions from much of its business, it has also been accused of burning or dumping unused or returned items.

2. Amazon uses greenwashing eco labels

In recent years, Amazon has launched a number of eco labels on its site, including its ‘Climate Pledge Friendly’ and ‘Amazon Aware’ badges. In 2022, it sold over 800 million products under the Climate Pledge Friendly label.

However, the company appears to have set a very low bar for inclusion – awarding the Climate Pledge Friendly badge to everything from single use batteries to disposable wet wipes.

Amazon gives the badge to products that have been certified, including by great labels like Organic and Fairtrade. But the retailer also allows much weaker certifications, like its own ‘Compact by Design’. Compact by Design only requires products to “have reduced water and/or air in the product or packaging for more efficient transportation.”

‘Amazon Aware’ also marks certified products, including some 100% organic or recycled clothing. However, Ethical Consumer found that some items only appeared to use around 50% certified materials, with the rest made up of uncertified content.  

An investigation by The Telegraph in 2022 found that Amazon Aware products had been made over 5,000 miles away and packaged in single-use plastic, leading to accusations that the company was “greenwashing on a grotesque scale”. 

3. Amazon promotes its ‘Climate Pledge’ while supporting oil and gas extraction

In 2019, Amazon co-founded the ‘Climate Pledge’ – a corporate initiative that sees big firms commit to net zero carbon emissions by 2040. Signatories include the likes of electronics company Sony, aviation company Alaska Airlines, and fossil fuel firm IGS Energy.

The pledge is not legally binding, and companies face no penalties for failing to meet its targets.

Despite the pledge, Amazon itself continues to provide services for oil and gas extraction.

Amazon Web Services partners with companies to provide technology for “managing crude oil and natural gas exploration” and “managing the gathering, processing, transportation, storage, and trading” of fossil fuels.

In 2023, Amazon quietly deleted one of its flagship climate measures under the initiative – a commitment to make 50% of its shipments net-zero carbon by 2030.

(Amazon wrote in a statement, "As we examined our work toward The Climate Pledge, we realized that it no longer made sense to have a separate and more narrow Shipment Zero goal that applied to only one part of our business, so we've decided to eliminate it.”)

4. Amazon says it is working towards net zero, but its emissions have increased

Amazon widely promotes its own target to meet net zero by 2040, and claims to be “driving climate solutions”.

Yet, the company’s emissions have increased since the target was first announced. 

Between 2019 and 2022, its emissions shot up by around 40%, from just over 50 million metric tonnes to more than 70 million (although they saw a small fall of 0.4% between 2021 and 2022).

In 2023, the retail giant was quietly dropped by the world’s leading accreditation for corporate climate targets – the Science-Based Target Initiative (SBTi), which assesses whether a company's targets are aligned with international climate goals.

Amazon was initially accredited by the SBTi in 2019, but lost the accreditation after the organisation tightened its criteria. Amazon said that it continued to work with STBi following the methodology change, but “it remains difficult for us to submit in a meaningful and accurate way.” 

5. Amazon’s commitment to renewable energy is not all that it seems

According to Amazon’s website, the company is “the largest corporate purchaser of renewable energy in the world” and operates “more than 500 renewable energy projects across the globe”.

However, the online giant has been accused of overstating its renewables involvement.

In November 2023, an investigation by WorldCrunch found that the company was promoting several projects in Spain that it did not in fact own. Worldcruch said that claims were “part of a massive greenwashing campaign” by the company.  

Instead, Amazon said that it mostly paid companies to produce wind and solar. While this is a good first step, the way that Amazon buys renewable energy doesn’t reduce emissions as much as it may first seem. A recent report estimated that its approach would only cut emissions by 40-70%. (The reasons are very technical: read more about power purchase agreements.)

Meanwhile, the company has lobbied against legislation to increase renewable energy use in the US. 

In 2023, it helped quash a bill in Oregon that would have forced its data centres in the state to run off 100% renewables by 2040. (The company said the legislation did not address gaps in infrastructure needed to meet higher clean energy demand.)

At one Oregon data centre, Amazon instead plans to increase its use of natural gas. The company faced protests in March 2024, with activists saying Amazon planned to source energy from a controversial new pipeline that will transport gas – including fracked gas – from Canada to the state.